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Resident Evil Was Originally Going to Be an SNES Game

What Would It Have Looked Like As an SNES Game?

Did you know that — before making its PlayStation debut in 1996 — Resident Evil was originally in development for the SNES? Neither did we, and it’s certainly fascinating to think about.

Koji Oda, who was hired by Capcom in 1991 to work on Super Ghouls ‘n’ Ghosts and The Magical Quest Starring Mickey Mouse, was interviewed by Game Informer during their Mega Man 11 cover story when he revealed the juicy tidbit.

“Honestly, I feel like I joined the game industry at the best time,” says Oda. “Typically, games would take half a year and no longer than a year to develop, so I feel like I was able to take part in a lot of different projects. It’s not that well known, but before Resident Evil went to the PlayStation, I was working on it for the Super NES.”

That version, of course, never came to be and development was switched to Sony’s PlayStation console which became a quick success when it launched in Japan in late 1994. Capcom’s management chose to move away from the cartridge lifestyle and to take advantage of the PS1’s extra power. That, as we all know, appears to have paid off for the horror franchise.

“This was back before the name Resident Evil had even been assigned to it,” continued Oda. “The codename for this was literally just ‘horror game.’ On the SNES, we were working with limited hard drive space, so it’s not like we could dump a movie in there. If we had actually completed it on the SNES, I’m sure it would have been considerably different. For example, it was originally set in a place that had nothing to do with reality – more of a hellish place.”

Despite its success with PlayStation, the series would eventually find its way back to Nintendo consoles when Resident Evil 2 was ported to the N64.